Who Lived in the Smoky Mountains?

The Great Smoky Mountains are in Tennessee and North Carolina. The mountains are called smoky for a reason. The air around them looks cloudy and smoky. Fog rising from the mountains makes the air look that way.

Many people visit Great Smoky Mountains National Park. People come to camp, hike, picnic, and more. It is a beautiful place.

The Cherokee

The Cherokee Indians were the first people to live in these mountains. Mountain living was hard. The Cherokee grew corn and beans to eat and trade.

The women did the farming and took care of the home. Women had a big say in how the group lived.

New Settlers

In the 1700s, other people came to the mountains. They traveled from far away places. They came from England, France, Germany, and Ireland.

The Cherokee helped these settlers learn how to live in the Smokies. A settler is someone who comes to a new place to live. The Cherokee learned new things from the settlers, too.

Moving the Cherokee

Later, the settlers wanted more land. The government sent soldiers to make the Cherokee leave.

The government moved the Cherokee to a new home. They had to move hundreds of miles away to Oklahoma. It was a sad event in the history of the Smokies and of the Cherokee.

The Cherokee Today

Today, most people who live in the Smokies are not Cherokee. But there are still some Cherokee living there. They teach others about Cherokee ways of life.

The Cherokee tell stories about plants and animals. They talk about their people. They talk about their home in the Smoky Mountains.